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pregancy afrer loss

Somewhere in my third trimester I came across this phrase printed on a necklace by Natalie Grant. I didn’t buy it (I know suprise suprise..perhaps I will later ) but it became sort of my mantra for the remainder of my pregnancy. I didn’t always succeed at it but it was a good reminder to go back to..sort of like when your mind may wander during Savasana…acknowledge the particular fear and then move on, have faith in God that this time a healthy baby would appear and all would be well. The following is my birth story. I wrote it the day after giving birth so there’s even more typos and grammatical errors than usual but I wanted to keep the freshness as is…

Tuesday I went to my MFM appt (I had been followed due to lyme, multiple losses and being AMA). During a monthly appt last month she had been measuring small so we went to weekly appoints for BPP’s she has been passing all of those but during Tuesday’s appt doc said she hadn’t really grown in the month so we needed to have the baby “today”. So I contact hubby, baby sitter, mom and went home to finalize packing.

I had feared this meant a repeat c-section because the OB’s office had said they really wouldn’t do much in way of induction because of uterine rupture chances. Thanks to reading vbac success stories and research I knew of the foley bulb and low dose pitocen

.

So I called the Ob coordinator and asked about what “having the baby today meant” could we have the membrane stripping, foley bulb, or low dose pitocen. She was going to call and talk to doc. Hours later she called back and said doc talked to OB and he talked to MFM who hadn’t realize I was a vbac so they thought let’s just schedule the csection tomorrow morning. (I had my mom and brother already driving up from MA, sitter had been there for a couple hour, I was in go mode). So i say again can we atleast try those things first since I was going to have my membranes stripped this week anyway? So she had the doctor call me and we talked about it and he was very open to me trying to get those things going before doing the section.

I had an awesome team of my doula and hubby. We got the foley bub in first, I started having contractions with that and those intensified. Massage, counter pressure, walking, yuji breath, (Stafford has a portable monitor there trying out so my nurse got dibs on it after reading my birth plan). When that finally came out hours later I was about about a four. One of my nurses took IV out early on after giving just one bag of fluid after reading my preferences. (I had been told by office that probably wouldn’t be allowed during one of my appointments). I covered about a 5k walking the halls during the hours of midnight -6. I had lots of runners fuel helping me since I wasn’t supposed to eat (I had gu, NUUN, coconut protein water, I did sneak a runners waffle bar and those things helped so much). By the end of the night somehow I hadn’t progressed much.

Early next the other OB on call had come in

to check, not much progression still. We had agreed on a couple house before starting pitocen. Hubby, doula and I took a nap. For some reason that doc came a less than our later…I was half asleep when he said he wanted to start the pitocin. So I had agreed because I wasn’t awake. Nurse seemed disappointed as I was because she knew I wanted to keep it as natural as possible and contractions probably spaced out because I was sleeping.

So later that day change of shifts. We pumped pitocen up to a 2. Things intensified further but I was able to breath through everything. Got checked, nothing much changed maybe getting closer to a 5 but that’s it. Bumped up pitocen up to 3. Even stronger contractions but things still weren’t moving as fast or as consistently as they had wanted. Original doc (the one that agreed to me trying for this vbac on Tuesday;) broke my water.

Between the increased pitocin and that the contractions were too much to handle. Couldn’t breath through them because they came on so fast and furious there was no time find a method to help. Agony. The nurse gave me phentenol (sp)? We had hoped that would be enough because she was so encouraging for me sticking to my birth plan. It didn’t help, at all. Too much. Eventually I pretty much demanded the epi.

So they came in and did that. She could see how disappointed I was and reminded me that number one I didn’t want the csection. She had wanted a vbac and never got one. I could do this.

She went to check and and said “it’s time to push”. I had expected it to be hours. I went from like a 4 and some change to ready in like 20 minutes. I ended up having my favorite OB arrive for delivery, she was great. A very relaxed situation. I got to have touch crowing, she was immediately on my chest (prior to bathing for a half hour or so) . She’s rooming in… While it was exactly how I envisioned I got my vbac, my rainbow baby and great support.

Some thoughts after the fact: At first I was very disappointed it wasn’t a “natural birth” but as i reflected on previous research I realized how lucky I was to have the birth I got . When you have to have all of these medical interventions (and it was necessary Evelyn was born at 5lbs 12oz at 39w2 and had already surpassed her birth weight at first docs visit/yay breast feeding) your chance of a vafibal birth period goes down. It was either induction or repeat c-csection. And when I stalled on progress with just the foley bulb and stripping alone I could of very easily been encouraged for a section by the doc that started the pitocen. And as my doula had mentioned the epidural did exactly what we needed it to: I went from a 4.something to a 10 in about a half hour…so I’m at peace. It was a night and day experience from my first birth, I went close to 20 something hours in labor without so much as a Tylenol, I got to hold my baby right away even before cord was cut and she never left my side.

Thank you to my team:

It would not have been possible without my team medical and other wise:

My lyme doctor: She kept me on the right Meds to keep me healthy enough to stay pregnant and keep the lyme at bay.

My Ob team: (Women’s Health and Surgery)they never once blanched at the Meds I needed to take, didn’t deny my lyme, got me my vbac with a healthy baby girl.

My Maternal Fetal medicine doctor: (Dr.Dhillion). The extra monitoring was huge both for my sanity but for keeping tabs on baby E. She’s here and healthy.

My prenatal yoga http://dragonflyyogafred.com/ Not only did she help me find a positive place in pregnancy which was huge for a pregnancy after loss mama but also physically prepared my body for labor, so many less aches and pains than with my son. I felt good and for someone with lyme that’s huge.

My maternity/newborn photographer , Chasing Dragonflys http://kmphotography2538.zenfolio.com/. Another component in finding positivity in this pregnancy. I found the celebration elemend in her work.

And the L&D nurses at Stafford: I leaned when my son was in the NICU nurses are basically my heroes. I couldn’t of had such a positive experience without these ladies.

And lastly my family, friends hubby and God. This pregnancy was daunting but people who leant a supportive ear during helped so so much.